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The main themes of "Unit 1: Teachers and Learners" are the description of what makes good teachers and learners. This unit answers the following questions: What skills make a good teacher?; What are the different roles of teachers in the classroom?; What skills make good learners? What are the different skill levels of language learning students? How are students of varying ages different?
Teachers must possess variety of skills and abilities to be effective in their teaching. Some of these include: knowledge of the subject; ability to assess student weaknesses and correct them accordingly and ability to motivate students. These skills and others must be present for a teacher to teach effectively. The teacher also serves different roles in the classroom. A teacher will transition from one role to another in a single classroom lecture to maximize student learning. The acronym MOPPTRAMO (my own personal invention) can be utilized remember the roles: manager, organizer, prompter, participant, tutor, resource, assessor, model and observer. The three most important roles to me are manager, organizer and assessor. These roles create a classroom that is primed for effective learning.
From here we transition to what makes good learners and how do we classify learners in terms of their experience with a language to better suit our teaching methods to their abilities. Also, this section of the lesson describes the characteristics of younger and older learners. Some of the characteristics of good learners include: willingness to listen to a language, ability to be creative with a language and willingness to take correction and learn from mistakes. Learners of all ages can be classified as: beginners, elementary learners, pre-intermediate, intermediate, upper intermediate and advanced users. The Common European Framework classifies learners into six tiers: A1-Breakthrough, A2-Waystage, B1-Threshold, B2-Vantage, C1-Effective Operational Proficiency, C2-Mastery. The age of learners--very young (0-7 years), pre-puberty (8-12 years), post-puberty (13-17 years) and adults (18+ years)--will often predict a wide variety of characteristics that affect learning desire and ability. Age can predict learning experience, motivation, nervousness, language awareness, behavior problems and life experience.
If teachers are aware of their own strengths and weaknesses relating to their own innate abilities and roles as well as the strengths and weaknesses of their students relating to their innate abilities and skill levels, they will be better able to grow professionally and teach effectively.
